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The Ancients Call

After finding an ancient portal structure you travel with it to the Ancients, protecting it from harm along the way.

WASD to move. Left click to fire. E to drop a bomb.
Protect the portal for five waves, until it charges and can transport you back. There are five areas, each more difficult. Reach the ancients after the final jump to win.

This is my first Ludum Dare entry, and I had a lot of fun making it. I wrote this game in Java.

I’m not entirely sure that I did the export and download setup correctly, so if there are any problems please let me know.

This game is incredibly difficult - the first round itself is almost impossible. After that, they are mostly pretty easy - except for the pink guys, which are very very difficult to deal with due to their density. I actually had a lot of fun while playing it due to the amount of difficulty despite the rather simple graphics, but I'm afraid I couldn't beat area 3 and I didn't want to try again. Have you actually beaten your game from start to finish? It really is a challenge. In any case, I think the one easiest change that would make the biggest difference is changing the background color of each area. Even with the simple graphics, this would really make a difference. I would, of course, also suggest using sprites and stuff, but that can be difficult for your first entry. I also think it would be nice if there was a way to tune down the difficulty, or if your guy had a faster firing rate. Overall, I think it is a fun game due to its difficulty - but I'm not sure that that is what you were going for.

Its bare bones, but functional. Basically the most you ask for out of a first time game jam. For further things to look into, you could add more feedback to player actions (simple sounds and animations), as well as making enemies with more complex behavior than moving in a straight line.

Definitely a game! Reminds me of Missile Command. except in a circle.
Already has fun, challenge and a story.
Now it needs sound and graphics.
Also, my finger is worn out. It needs to autofire or something. I probably clicked 1000 times.

Nice variation in enemies. Trading speed for hit points is pretty on point.

Congrats on your first jam! I have to disagree with other commenters - the game didn't seem too difficult. It could have used some graphics and audio, but given it's your first time, let's have it slide for now. ;)

Got to portal 3, but had trouble sticking with it. Really nice fundamentals, but it all felt too similar after the first portal.

Think you managed to do a good bit with the graphics with just the couple of shapes you used, but I might use some more mellow colors next time. You should give audio a try too! Shooters + audio are always a good mix.

fairly simple and straightforward game, the control feels nice, but autofire could be nice
and also the health bar on the enemy a bit reverse, it should be green when full health, not red, but really i'm just nitpicking

Hey I just played your game, that was really interesting. I also participated for the first time, so consider it in my comment :)
I found the game pretty boring at first sight, but playing it became quickly addictive, I wanted to see what will happen, which enemies will I found and I found myself playing again after something like 15 minutes haha
I've hardly understood why everyone is so mad with the ancient point, and if the game is proceduraly generated or not so I didn't finished it; but this might be due to the fact I didn't sleep for nearly 30 hours haha
Nice game eventually, had fun to play and that's all about it ;)
See you next on LD 37 ! Thanks !

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